Look familiar? An illustration from the 1897 Scribner's article "Undergraduate Life at Harvard," picturing a room in Claverley, and a recent addition to the Suite's expanding collection of Harvard ephemera.

We are thrilled today to announce two $50,000 grants from the Lillian Goldman Charitable Trust to help fund the Foundation’s operations for the next two years. In addition to providing the money necessary to launch The New Fireside Chats web broadcasts, the annual grants will help develop our planned FDR Suite Internet Museum, expand the Suite’s historical collections, as well as fund day-to-day operations at the Suite. (And we have considerable day-to-day expenses: insurance on the Suite alone runs close to 2K per year, and other than heat and electricity, we receive no financial support from the College…)

The structure of this award was deliberate: splitting the amount into two 50K segments to be paid this year and next was designed to act as a challenge grant, spurring folks like you to help us raise the additional 50K we need complete our annual budget and begin our educational mission of expanding FDR’s legacy into the electronic age.

So in order to put the Foundation on a firm financial footing, we launch today our 2011 capital campaign. Won’t you consider donating at one of these levels?

Member $100
Supporter $250
Donor $500
Trustee $1000
Angel $5000

(And of course, there’s always the Deity level… lol)

If everyone on this mailing list donated just $100, we’d make our goals – unfortunately only a small percentage of you do – 4%, in fact.

I know there are a thousand demands on your charitable dollars, but we’d like to think that our particular combination of Harvard History, House History and presidential history is pretty special and worth supporting.

In addition, if  we make our goal, it greatly increases the chance that these grants will be renewed in future years (and attract other monies to fund our planned scholarship programs, which are so far unfunded.)

So long story short, whatever you can contribute, please do. Just click the How to Donate Button at the top of this page. I will keep you posted on our progress.

And one final note: a number of you inquired during our hugely pleasant Fourth Annual Memorial Lecture & Reception this past Saturday whether or not these events were considered fundraisers for the Suite, and strictly, the answer is no: this lecture series is part of our educational mission, and we price the tickets each year principally to cover our costs, which means depending on attendance, we generally just break even. Hopefully however our attendees go away with a better sense of our mission and an increased inclination to support it. At least that’s the idea!

As always, we remain grateful for your interest and support.